Me vs Myself

Me, myself, and I may refer to the same person, but they are not interchangeable. Myself should be the one you hear the least, but it’s often used incorrectly in place of me.

Me

Me is an object pronoun, which means that it refers to the person that the action of a verb is being done to, or to whom a preposition refers.

They want me to study more.

Tell me a story.

Between you and me, he’s right.

Carol wants to meet with John and me tomorrow.

The book was written entirely by me.

Please call Hillary or me with any questions.

Myself

Myself is a reflexive or stressed pronoun, which means that, generally speaking, it should be used in conjunction with the subject pronoun I, not instead of the object pronoun me.

I bought myself a car.

I myself started the company.

I did the laundry by myself.

I feel like myself again.

Tired of waiting, I just did it myself.

The Bottom Line

Myself can be used for stress, but most grammarians won’t allow it to be used alone – they reject constructions like “Carol wants to meet with John and myself” (correct: with John and me) and “The book was written entirely by myself” (correct: by me personally).

Just remember that myself can be reflexive (I’m doing something to/for myself) or emphatic (I myself). Otherwise, you probably want to use me.

Oh no!… I just emailed a response via email and said: “I will ask Tom and the Controller if they will be available to attend. If not, it will only be myself”. Based on your replies, my response was totally incorrect

No, the correct would be: “Carol wants to meet with John and me”
If you take John out of the sentence, it would not be “Carol wants to meet with I”, it would be “Carol wants to meet with me” so anything else you add doesn’t change the “me”. To some people, it may sound better to the ear if you say “Carol wants to meet with me and John”.

Probably “myself,” because even if you don’t explicitly say the first few words, the basic idea is that you’re saying something like “I’m going to tell you a little bit about myself” – myself is used in conjunction with “I” as in the examples above.

There is no “drop the rest of the phrase” rule – I mentioned that in regard to a specific example: A little bit about me/myself, in which case it seems clear that the person has already said something like “Let *me* tell you a bit about myself” (emphasis added).

In your example, there’s not necessarily any need to stress “myself.” You have to remember that myself is more about style than grammar: it’s for emphasis, to make it very clear that you’re talking about yourself and no one else: I did it myself, I bought it for myself, etc.

Including is a verb, and the default object of that verb is a direct object: me. Myself is an intensive or reflexive pronoun, neither of which necessarily applies here, unless you’ve preceded your example with something like “I’m a scientist, and many scientists – including myself…” But if you’re just talking about science in general and then make that statement, myself is out of place: it’s not needed for stress or to make the sentence reflexive.

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The words stationary and stationery are often confused by English speakers due to their similar spelling and pronunciation. If you remain stationary in front of your computer, you can copy this lesson onto your own stationery.

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Though it’s no longer official, over is widely considered incorrect when used in front of a number; the correct term is more than. You’ll have learned more than you need to know once you’ve read over this lesson.